An old quote from David Whyte. I’ve experienced the truth of it: I can suddenly shift from utter exhaustion to vibrant aliveness and wholeheartedness—if the right circumstances arise.

This doesn’t mean I’m a victim of my circumstances, because I am responsible to search out and cultivate the circumstances that can evoke life from within me. Do you know how to find the circumstances that would evoke life from within you?

I think growth is less about our need for “healing” than it is about the cultivation of a context that evokes aliveness from within us.

Why did Carl Jung say that most theories of counseling actually “hinder the realization of meaningful experience”? Could he be right that a lot of therapy is actually more harmful than helpful?

Here are my thoughts on why a lot of counseling marketing is bullshit.

(By the way, I’m renouncing perfectionism! So you may need to turn the volume up, or use headphones, because the sound on this video is a bit low.)

By Rainer Maria Rilke
(translated by Robert Bly)

It’s possible I am pushing through solid rock
in flintlike layers, as the ore lies, alone;
I am such a long way in I see no way through,
and no space: everything is close to my face,
and everything close to my face is stone.

I don’t have much knowledge yet in grief
so this massive darkness makes me small.
You be the master: make yourself fierce, break in:
then your great transforming will happen to me,
and my great grief cry will happen to you.